Pangaea Prize for Poets

Posted on March 30, 2013 by janets123

Pangaea Prize for Poets

Enter a series of poems with a common theme. Not big prize money but winner gets published in an anthology & nominated for the Push Cart!!!

The Pangaea Prize

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Unbelievable Unleavened PBs

Posted on March 19, 2013 by janets123

In a bit of a hurry, no time for this but just really craving a soft, warm, homemade treat, I decided to whip up these cookies, noting the recipe said it was EASY. (Adapted from a recipe on C&H Sugar package in 2001.) I don’t think I’ve made them more than once or twice, since absolutely nothing beats my mom’s old peanut butter cookie recipe from back in the 1950’s.

Right now my kitchen is undergoing preparations for Passover. I’ve my eye on sources of leaven that will be discarded in a few days. Matzos are in the cabinet. So as I mixed these up & double-checked the ingredients, I realized, not only is there NO FLOUR in the recipe, there’s no baking soda either! What a great recipe to share for the days of Unleavened Bread. Enjoy!

Unbelievable Unleavened Peanut Butter Cookies

1 cup granulated sugar

1 cup peanut butter

1 large egg

1 teaspoon vanilla

Preheat oven to 325˚F. Combine all ingredients to thoroughly blend. Dip teaspoonful & roll in hands to make a 2” long log. Place 2” apart on ungreased cookie sheets. Flatten with 3-prong meat fork; criss-cross if desired. Bake 15-17 minutes until lightly browned. Let cool 45 seconds then remove to wax paper or wire racks.

Makes about 30 cookies.

77 calories

4.4g fat

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My Blue Thumb

Posted on March 14, 2013 by janets123

I do not have a green thumb when it comes to growing plants. I have just enough success to keep me semi-motivated and hopeful, so I suppose it isn’t what people would call brown, either. I think it’s blue.

It’s pretty sad to have a blue thumb because I love to garden. Or at least I did until I moved to Texas. My particular spot in this big state sits in what the USDA calls the Grand Prairie. The Texas Almanac website describes it pretty well:

“Upland soils are mostly dark-gray, alkaline clays; some are shallow over limestone and some are stony. Some areas have light-colored loamy soils over chalky limestone.”

If that wasn’t a description of one the worst places ever to plant a gardener, my particular spot is also not securely fenced. It would keep out a rabbit, I suppose, or a dog. But my garden sits next to 650 acres of woods. Our fence does not keep out the things that climb and dig and fly.

I should have known something was wrong when the Bermuda grass didn’t encroach. I should have known this wasn’t going to work when a varmint dug up fourteen hills of potatoes in one night.

Moving here from a more normal part of the world, I went searching for oat straw for my first vegetable garden. The confused clerks kept pointing me to landscape mulch. Last year I found out local gardeners mulch with pine bark to make the soil more acidic. I amended the alkaline soil but then watered it with alkaline tap water from our alkaline lakes.

I deterred a few varmints (and gardeners) with smelly toilet bowl fresheners hung from the tomato cages. I discovered garden marauders also don’t care for Cinnabar perfume by Estee Lauder.

I bought some fertilizer, albeit chemical, that also acidifies the soil. It comes highly recommended by the guy who sells it. We’ll see how that works short term, while I continue to build up my storehouse of organic matter. (That is, I will try to build it up faster than the organic-eating varmints deplete it.)

All this would sound like good excuses for not having green digits attached to my hands. Except I’m also having a bit of trouble in the potted plants, which are in perfectly wonderful dirt and sitting by the front drive where critters rarely venture.

Last summer the pots had the most horrible attack of aphids I’ve ever experienced. I think my garden sage is all done in. It has roots, though, so I’m waiting to see what spring brings before singing the blue thumb eulogy.

It is spring here, by the way, and has been since the middle of February. I saw grasshoppers on March first. Summer is expected on March 15 and the drought arrives, typically, by the first of June.

I keep pots in the house, also. Some are those fussy tropicals like Christmas cactus. They’re fine. It’s the peace lily that refuses to thrive in Texas. Peace lily is the easiest, least troublesome house plant I’ve ever owned. At least it was, until I moved it here.

Here, the leaves turned yellow, then brown, then crunchy. I repotted and fertilized and got new, baby leaves—beautiful leaves until they grew up, turned yellow, etc. So, though the plant is over three years old, it’s still about the same size it was when I moved here.

I stumbled across the problem on an Internet plant site—roly polies. Or pill bugs, as most people call them. They’re not true bugs, but crustaceans, and diatomaceous earth will do them in. So there. Except I’m still seeing those brown leaves, though not as often, and still singing about my blue thumb.

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How People Are

Posted on March 11, 2013 by janets123

Today I am going to a baby shower for a young woman I hardly know. All the other attendees will be strangers complete and thirty years younger than me. But I was invited and I need to get to know the guest of honor—she’s my new niece.

I haven’t been to a baby shower in quite a long time but I think I remember how it’s done. There will be some innovations with this new generation, I’m sure. The games may be new, or electronic; they might even eliminate them. The food will not be made from scratch. But people are people. It can’t be all that foreign.

On our recent vacation, we were on a cruise ship full of “older folks.” I discovered I am beginning to be more comfortable around people of a certain age. They’re more predictable and easier to understand.

Seniors don’t say “He’s hot,” when they want to convey admiration for a handsome man. They don’t say, “It’s cool,” when accepting my apology for stepping on their toes. People my age know what I’m talking about when I say, “Y.M.C.A.” or “Bus Stop” and shuffle my feet. They think before they speak, for the most part, and they’re practiced at making those around them feel at ease.

There are exceptions to my generalities. Nothing is poopier than a poopy senior citizen. Nothing is uglier than a white-haired, wrinkled face spouting crass words. People will be people and some of them don’t learn much by age sixty.

As a race, humans are naturally self-centered. I’m pretty sure we’re born that way but I’m confident our early childhood training reinforces it.

For the first two years of life, we are the center of our mother’s universe. We cry; she attends our every need, want or whim. We are Important.

Two toddlers meeting for the first time are delightful to watch. For about two minutes they may flirt, hug and kiss and give one another toys. Two Important people are bound to clash, though. Suddenly and inexplicably, there is an eruption of temper—one baby is howling and the other (the one with the toy in his hand) is scowling fiercely.

Look ahead fifteen years. A young lady is Face Booking a nasty diatribe against her former friend—the one with the boy in her clutches.

Some years later, hopefully but a few, these kids have learned to overcome their self-centeredness to a degree. They learn diplomacy, generosity, gratefulness and empathy. They’re still Important but they don’t have to act like it—at least not all the time.

My hope today is our social hour together will be not unpleasant, the women attending will learn something from the matronly aunt and the aunt will come away pleasantly surprised at how well the toddlers have grown. She might even learn something new about how people are.

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Underwater Walking

Posted on February 28, 2013 by janets123

Starfish gazingBecause I can’t swim, I panic when water comes over my face. I’m not sure why I keep having adventures in the water but since Daniel and I married three years ago, I seem to always be getting wet.

He owned a Jet Ski, so we took it to the lake. Wearing life vests, we rode double. I was thrilled but not too frightened. Then my husband had a thought—What if we turned this little bobbing thing over in the middle of the lake? Would we be able to get back on? He decided we should find out, closer to shore.

We got off in the shallows, water past our waists. He climbed on and grabbed the handle bars. I tried to climb up and dumped us both off. I screamed and we splashed.

We tried again. He told me to get on more quickly. I screamed; we splashed. I tried getting on more slowly. I tried not rocking the ski. I tried. I screamed.

I don’t like water in my face but as long as I can get my feet under me and feel solid ground, I’m okay.

I remember one time at a pool party this gullible fellow let himself be coerced into pushing me in, just for fun. Much to his dismay, I took him with me, hanging onto his neck for dear life. I very nearly strangled him.

When our feet touched the bottom of the concrete pool, I un-panicked, opened my eyes, saw the fear of death on his face and let him go. I floated to the top and they hauled me out. I don’t think that poor guy ever got over it.

I’ve also been at the bottom of the Illinois River in Oklahoma, the bottom of the Arkansas River in Colorado and the bottom of Lake Worth in Texas. Recently, I found myself at the bottom of the ocean off the coast of Honduras.

The first three involved some sort of unintentional splash. I associate them with terror, panic and prayer. This latest was an adventure I volunteered for and calmly walked down a very long ladder to get into. I wore a helmet full of air, didn’t even get my face wet.

For this type of “diving,” the helmet is connected by a long hose to an air tank on the surface. The pump is continually supplying fresh air. The helmet makes a constant gurgling sound and emits a superfluity of bubbles from a vent in the back.

The diver must keep the heavy helmet in an upright position at all times or water will come in. One must not walk too fast or try to look up at the surface. But when a certain diver forgets, she need not panic but simply stand still for a few seconds while the helmet refills with air.

Several friends who’ve seen the video of this adventure said they would be frightened by it or too claustrophobic. One said he could swim but could not cope with being thirty feet down. One said being enclosed in the helmet would scare her. One told me she wouldn’t want all those fishes swarming around. I thought those were the fun parts.

I didn’t dwell too much on how the pressure hurt my ears or how a fellow diver had to ascend early because of an intense, sudden headache. I didn’t tell anyone about the disclaimers we signed acknowledging the possibility of aneurism and death. I only briefly mentioned how the seventy-eight-degree water felt like ice to my ninety-eight-degree body.

The video editor took out all the scenes wherein I worked my jaw to relieve the pressure on my ears and the part when the current nearly knocked me off my feet. They didn’t catch my eyes bulging when my helmet tipped and sea water came in up to my nose. The pictures don’t show the discomfort of the seventy-pound helmet on my shoulders or the annoying gurgle that masked the soft nature sounds of fish nibbling on coral.

What I remember is my excitement at walking on the ocean floor, seeing live coral, anemones and turquoise water peculiar to the Caribbean Sea. Vivid in my mind is actually seeing and touching all the bright and curious little fishes, a sea urchin attaching itself to my palm and the feel of soft suckers on the underbody of a starfish. I was thrilled at the possibility as the scuba diver tried to herd a tiny spotted ray into my grasp, disappointed when he escaped.

I’m not sure I could have enjoyed all that while wearing a mask and flippers and a scuba tank. There’s simply nothing like having one’s feet on solid ground.

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Courage

Posted on February 17, 2013 by janets123

I have an unreasonable fear of escalators. There is a plausible explanation for it, starting back in the ‘70’s when I fell on one of the contraptions wearing platform shoes and a mini-skirt. But my nervousness has escalated through the years to the point I often seek out elevators and stairs even when it’s exponentially inconvenient.

During our recent trip through Galveston, I bought a little compilation of nuggets of encouragement titled Dare to Believe.* The page that sold me reads, “Courage is doing what you’re afraid to do. There can be no courage unless you’re scared.” It made me think of my battle with escalator panic.

On the way to Honduras a couple of nights later, sleepless before my first attempt at snorkeling, I whispered, “There can be no courage unless you’re scared. Courage is doing what you’re afraid to do. Tomorrow, I get to exercise courage.”

Riding on a lovely catamaran, sitting in the tropical sun and enjoying the coastline view, I wasn’t particularly nervous as we sailed out to the reef. There were life jackets. I could always stay near the boat if I was frightened.

The crew distributed the snorkeling tube and mask sets. I had to ask if I was to put the whole thing in my mouth. I had to have help untangling the goggles from my ponytail. I practiced breathing and found out the nose gizmo is designed to prevent one from breathing through her nostrils and force one to breathe through the tube. I made sure my flippers fit. I was scared.

The divers split us into the novice group and the more experienced. Standing at the back of the boat, watching my husband splash into the ocean, I nearly panicked. “I need to go in slowly,” I pleaded with the soft-eyed Honduran captain.

He suggested I sit down and jump from a lesser height. I tried. The terror wouldn’t leave me. “Can I use the ladder?”

I thought I was going to have to stay on the catamaran with the tall dude in the cowboy hat who said he came for the sailboat ride.

I shakily eased down the ladder but when I found myself bobbing around in four-foot swells, I very nearly climbed back up.

I forgot all about my courage quote. I remembered I had traveled three days to get here and paid a ridiculous amount of money to snorkel in clear Caribbean waters. I told myself that I was physically able to do this if I could just stop the panic.

I put the tube in my mouth and breathed out. The nose cup pinched shut when I tried to breathe in; I panicked and pulled the thing out, gasping. The life vest flipped me onto my back and a wave washed over me. I sputtered and re-inserted the snorkel tube.

In, out, in, out, I practiced. I kicked my flippers and swam with my head up and arms straight in front of me. When I tried to put my face down, water fogged my mask and gurgled in my ears.

In, out, in, out, the snorkel was working. I tried again to put my head down. Fighting the life vest, the only way I could stay on my belly was to keep kicking, arch my back, extend my arms and keep my face in the water. I began to see things.

A blue fish swam by, then a yellow one. Through the clear, green water, I saw the ocean floor and mounds of coral. I was snorkeling! On a reef! Head up, snorkel out, I looked for someone to tell. “I…oh…Daniel!” The ocean filled my mouth. I spit it out, reinserted the tube and put my face down to look some more. I would have to wait to share my excitement.

Through my mask, I watched the diver snap photos of creatures on the bottom of the ocean twenty feet below me. I saw fishes galore. I kicked and swam, full of the wonder and joy of being someplace and doing a thing I’d never imagined I’d do.

The diver brought us a sand dollar from the bottom and passed it around for all to examine. Okay, it was a skeleton, but it was a first for me and I was thrilled.

For forty-five minutes I snorkeled, swimming at the head of the class. I was bobbing around in the ocean, for Pete’s sake! I can’t swim!

Suddenly my air tube was giving me water instead of air. I held my breath while I tried to decide what to do. I put my head up, pulled the tube out and caught my breath. The life jacket flipped me over and the ocean came in. I stopped breathing, bobbed up and gulped air.

I learned to blow out hard to clear the snorkel but each time it filled with water I was compelled to gulp a small mouthful of salt water. I wondered if that was acceptable. My husband saw my distress and asked if I was okay.

“Yes,” I answered, and stuck the tube back in. It filled with water again.

“No, I think I’m tired,” I sputtered. “I keep getting water.” I raised my hand for the man in the kayak who was supposed to tow distressed swimmers back to the catamaran.

Daniel was at my side in a second. “Grab my shoulder, baby.”

Both of us gasping for air, both of us tired, it was a very long swim back to that distant boat, then another seventy feet around to the back. I was so glad to see my ladder! Rubber-legged, covered with sticky salt and bedraggled, I couldn’t stop grinning as I wobbled to safety.

The rest of the group filtered in right behind us. Talking and laughing and sharing lunch on board the big boat, everyone had a wonderful adventure. Even the cowboy seemed to have a good time by osmosis.

I am so glad I overcame my fear, though I didn’t feel a bit courageous out there in the deep blue water. I can’t wait to try this out on the next escalator.

*The author’s website: http://writedirections.com/publications.php
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Oh, Galveston!

Posted on February 14, 2013 by janets123

We had only two weeks to anticipate and prepare for our winter cruise to the Caribbean. My husband and I decided to spend the night in Galveston, rather than arrive the day of our sailing and take a chance that car trouble or other untoward event might cause us to miss the boat.

For fourteen days we planned—wear this to the snorkeling excursion in Honduras; need this for walking in Belize; take this for the road trip but leave it in Galveston. One bag would stay in the trunk of the car while we lost ourselves in the tropical islands.

We don’t know any songs for traveling to the warm climes but we sang anyway as we bubbled with anticipation. “Galveston, oh Galveston! I still hear your sea waves crashing. I was twenty-one, when I left Galveston.” Or something like that.

As we drove south through Texas the landscape changed dramatically. Just north of Houston, we began to see pine trees galore, red bud trees starting to bloom and spikes of yellow mullein on the green easements. The south side of Houston is landscaped with palm trees. Bougainvillea and oleander seem to bloom year-round there.

There is a port in Sam Houston’s city, from which freight goes in and out to the Gulf of Mexico. Next year, a couple of the cruise lines will embark there.

The real port, the one that looks at the ocean, is another half hour down the highway. That’s Galveston.

Before long, we began to see billboards for rum, Mexican food, gumbo and live music. Galveston is party town, especially in February. We also saw a multitude of huge white storage tanks and cranes reaching into the sky, signs of the oil trade that keeps the community alive when the winter tourists go away.

As we drove over the bridge to the island, I saw muddy ocean unique to this place, boat dealers instead of car lots and spindly houses on twiggy stilts waiting for the next hurricane.

Flat water on each side of the highway was decorated with islands of stiff grass, white egrets, pelicans and the ubiquitous, noisy gulls. There were more palm trees and fewer deciduous varieties. More flowers bloomed in the green spaces downtown: cannas, hibiscus, bougainvillea and oleander, roses and marigolds. We had entered another climate, another world.

That’s Galveston—sea winds blowin’, sea waves crashin’, sea birds flyin’ in the sun, oh, Galveston. It is no wonder Glen Campbell’s 1969 song caught on and stayed the course for a generation.

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A Little, a Lot, and That’s About Right

Posted on February 2, 2013 by janets123

My sweetheart likes hot food. Take that anyway you want—he likes 200 degree soup and jalapenos. Most restaurants serve their soup just nice and warm, according to Daniel’s temp gauge, so he asks them to get it “really hot.” Sometimes he has to send it back for “really, really hot.” If it is a place we frequent, the waiter tells the cook, “It’s the 212 guy. You know, boil the soup and blister his tongue.”

When trying to describe things, anyone is bound to be misunderstood if he uses terms like “hot” or “a little warmer, please.” The English language is pervaded by vagaries and words easy to be mistaken.

Do you want a lot of mashed potatoes? Is that a dollop or half a cup? Just a little pie might be 1/6 of an 8-inch plate or 1/8 of a 9-inch dish, depending upon the server.

We hate to sound so picky and exacting as to be labeled a trouble-maker. “That’s about right,” we condescend to the person trying to meet our needs and preferences, leaving her wondering if it should have been a little more or a little less.

“Let your yea be yea,” says the Scripture. I suppose we should ask for a 2 1/2-inch slice of pie, 180-degree soup and a bill that’s less than twenty dollars, thank you. Anything else can be misconstrued.

For me, life is better if I just allow for misunderstandings and give as much grace as I would like to be given.

I will save nit-pickiness for when the subject is truly critical, like where to put my name on the book cover.

By-the-way, I am writing this as we leave our local internet service for a few days so your comments will show up when we return. Does that sound about right?

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The Traveler

Posted on January 25, 2013 by janets123

As a child, I discovered the love of reading before I was supposed to. I figured out my father’s name on a prescription bottle. I’ve no idea how I recognized the capital J and T but when Momma confirmed my extrapolation, doors opened.

I read billboards and sale posters. I thrilled to the challenge of sounding out new words and puzzling out new concepts. My parents started buying books for me to devour. I requested books for every gifting occasion–Tom Sawyer, Little Women, Black Beauty, Mrs. Wiggs in the Cabbage Patch, The Boxcar Kids, Greek myths and Pooh stories. Consequently, I excelled at academics but I did not learn to cook.

“What do you want to be when you grow up?”

“I dunno.”

“You probably want to get married and raise a family?”

“No! I don’t want to get married. I want to go to Europe–maybe France. Maybe I’ll marry a French chef.”

I suppose my childish logic thought that would solve everything. The chef could do the cooking; my longing to see the world I read about would be fulfilled; people could stop asking me what I wanted to do with my life.

I married a man who didn’t cook but he taught me how to cut up a chicken. We took day trips on a motorcycle. Meanwhile, my sister went on a mission trip to Jamaica. She celebrated her retirement by going to Hawaii with her church choir. My mom visited Mexico, California, Florida and Tennessee. My daughter’s fiancé flew her to Paris. After they married, he took her to Hawaii, Singapore and Ohio, where they bought a house. I was so jealous, my tears were green.

A lifetime later, my daughter asked me to visit her expatriated family in Hong Kong. I obtained a passport and I flew. And flew and flew and flew. I went to the zoo in Minneapolis. I rode the trains in China, visited the open markets, ate sweet potato leaves, smelled the sea, saw a statue of Jackie Chan and rode to the top of Mount Victoria. I bought two-dollar postcards in the Tokyo airport. I was a traveler!

About three years ago, I married again. This adorable guy really enjoys travel. He’s taken me on ocean cruises in the Caribbean, flown me to Arizona and Tennessee, driven me to Arkansas and the Alamo and Cripple Creek, Colorado.

I am learning to do what I love. (Ahem: blove.) It all started with a J and a T.

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Sharp Knives

Posted on January 18, 2013 by janets123

I heard someone say recently, “If we outlaw guns because they’re used to commit crime, then we ought to outlaw knives also.” This started me thinking about how my kitchen knives could be used as weapons.

My sister gave me some new steak knives this week and they are extremely sharp. The old ones are still keen too, even though the handles have started to delaminate. I saved them just in case I ever serve steak to an inordinate number of guests.

Most of our knives are kept in a drawer. We’ve learned to recognize the handles and pick out the needed utensil gingerly. Only a knucklehead would stick his hand in there and start rummaging around.

If I had to defend myself from an intruder, using only a blade, I’d probably grab a large carving knife. They are stout, intimidating, and capable of cutting through watermelon rind. I rarely use them, so they aren’t maintained in sharp condition. Right after Thanksgiving would be a good time to choose this one.

I have a carbon steel utility knife with a flexible seven-inch blade that I employ all the time. It dulls easily and whets quickly so it is always either very sharp or not. If we had a break in, would I remember how easily the onions diced at dinner? Probably not.

The long bread knife would be scary looking, especially in the dark. The wavy, serrated blade is designed for sawing back and forth. In a pinch, it does a pretty good job carving meat. Its distinctive pearl and silver handle makes it easy to find in the drawer.

We have this cute little set of knives in a block on the counter top. These might be my weapon of choice simply because they’re easy to grab. They’re never sharp and the blades are short but in the blink of an eye I could have one in each hand—jab-jab!

If a bad guy broke into my house in the middle of the night, if he’d cased the property and knew we were home, or if he’d done this dastardly deed before and been surprised by homeowners, he would probably be armed. I think if I tried to run him off with a knife, I’d get myself dead.

So, all this exercise in preparing my mind to choose a knife to defend myself and my property…is simply exercise.

I have a gun; I keep it loaded; it is in an easy-to-grab location; I practice using it so I’m comfortable with the grip and the way it handles. The only mind exercise required is a pre-meditated decision to point and shoot at a living being who intends me harm.

I shot a wild turkey once, because she was hurting my little bantam hen. I didn’t intend to kill her—she was forty yards away and I chose a B-B gun. I think the principal is the same.

If the current administration outlaws assault weapons, only criminals will have them. I have a backup plan but maybe I should also sharpen my knives.

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